Levada enters fray over holy rite / No blanket denial of Communion for stand on abortion

Don Lattin, Chronicle Religion Writer

Published
4:00 am PDT, Thursday, June 24, 2004

San Francisco Archbishop William Levada says Catholics -- including Catholic politicians -- must accept church teaching about "the evil of abortion" if they want to remain "in full communion with the faith of the church."

At the same time, the archbishop says he would not actually deny Holy Communion to abortion-rights supporters until he could "listen to their concerns and offer them the opportunity for a fruitful examination of Catholic teaching."

Levada, chairman of the U.S. bishops Committee on Doctrine, was one of three bishops who made presentations last week at a closed-door meeting in Colorado of about 250 American prelates.

His remarks, among a series of papers released by the church late Wednesday, also form the basis of a column that Levada will publish in Friday's edition of Catholic San Francisco, the official weekly newspaper of the archdiocese.

Several bishops around the country have issued an outright ban on Catholic politicians -- or even Catholic voters -- receiving Communion unless they recant their support for abortion rights.

Communion is the central act of worship at a Roman Catholic Mass, a ritual that is believed to transform a small wafer and quantity of wine into the actual body and blood of Jesus Christ.

According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, "anyone aware of having sinned mortally must not receive Communion."

While Levada agrees that "abortion holds a unique place" in Catholic social teaching, he takes a more conciliatory approach to the controversy -- which has re-emerged with the presidential candidacy of Sen. John Kerry, a Catholic politician with a long record of supporting legal abortion.

Some Catholic members of Congress, including Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the San Francisco Democrat and House minority leader, have publicly complained that they have been "singled out" by the bishops for their stance on abortion.

Levada concedes there is a difference between a politician voting on an abortion law and a woman who actually gets an abortion or a doctor who performs one.

"Can a politician be guilty of formal cooperation in evil?" he asks. "If the person intends to promote the killing of innocent life, she/he would be guilty of such sinful cooperation. ... But this seems unlikely as a general rule."

Before denying Communion to any Catholic who supports abortion rights, Levada said a bishop or priest should first inquire about their "intentions, about their understanding of their faith obligations, about their role in living out their faith in public life."

"The state of the person's awareness of their situation is of paramount importance," Levada concludes.

Levada also acknowledges that Catholic politicians have the "complex and difficult task" to consider "conflicting points of view in society, and the recognition that laws may have to take into account prevailing societal attitudes and customs."

Maurice Healy, a spokesman for the archbishop, said Levada and the majority of U.S. bishops hope to turn the political confrontation over abortion into a deeper discussion of Catholic faith and public life.

Healy said a recent letter to the bishops by Pelosi and other Catholic lawmakers is "a wonderful opportunity to engage them."

"It (the debate over abortion) is back on the table," Healy said. "We want to engage all Catholics in that dialogue -- including Catholic politicians."

Levada also serves on a U.S. bishops' task force studying Roman Catholics in public life.

In another document released by the bishops on Wednesday, the chairman of that committee, Cardinal Theodore McCarrick of Washington, D.C., advises his fellow bishops that withholding Communion from politicians could hurt the church in its efforts to stop abortion.

In his remarks at last week's private Colorado retreat, McCarrick warned that keeping the sacrament from defiant Catholic lawmakers could turn Communion into a "partisan political battleground," create a backlash in support of abortion rights and raise concerns about the loyalties of Catholic politicians.

"It could be more difficult for faithful Catholics to serve in public life because they might be seen not as standing up for principle, but as under pressure from the hierarchy," McCarrick said. "We could turn weak leaders who bend to the political winds into people who are perceived as courageous resistors of episcopal authority."

McCarrick said Communion should only be denied "when efforts at dialogue, persuasion and conversion have been fully exhausted."

Church leaders at the Colorado meeting voted 183-6 to adopt a statement warning lawmakers at odds with church teaching that they are "cooperating in evil," but they made no definitive statement on whether they should be denied Communion.

Under church law, each bishop decides how to apply Catholic teaching in his own diocese.

McCarrick's task force is not expected to complete its work until after the November presidential election.

But Cardinal William Keeler, another task force member, told the bishops in Colorado that the prelates who expressed an opinion to the panel opposed using Communion as a sanction by about 3-1.